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Since Evil is here, "haunting this world by necessary law,"
and it is the Soul's design to escape from Evil, we must escape
hence.
But what is this escape?
"In attaining Likeness to God," we read. And this is explained as
"becoming just and holy, living by wisdom," the entire nature
grounded in Virtue.
But does not Likeness by way of Virtue imply Likeness to some
being that has Virtue? To what Divine Being, then, would our
Likeness be? To the Being- must we not think?- in Which, above
all, such excellence seems to inhere, that is to the Soul of the
Kosmos and to the Principle ruling within it, the Principle
endowed with a wisdom most wonderful. What could be more fitting
than that we, living in this world, should become Like to its
ruler?
But, at the beginning, we are met by the doubt whether even in
this Divine-Being all the virtues find place- Moral-Balance
[Sophrosyne], for example; or Fortitude where there can be no
danger since nothing is alien; where there can be nothing
alluring whose lack could induce the desire of possession.
If, indeed, that aspiration towards the Intelligible which is in
our nature exists also in this Ruling-Power, then need not look
elsewhere for the source of order and of the virtues in
ourselves.
But does this Power possess the Virtues?
We cannot expect to find There what are called the Civic Virtues,
the Prudence which belongs to the reasoning faculty; the
Fortitude which conducts the emotional and passionate nature; the
Sophrosyne which consists in a certain pact, in a concord between
the passionate faculty and the reason; or Rectitude which is the
due application of all the other virtues as each in turn should
command or obey.
Is Likeness, then, attained, perhaps, not by these virtues of the
social order but by those greater qualities known by the same
general name? And if so do the Civic Virtues give us no help at
all?
It is against reason, utterly to deny Likeness by these while
admitting it by the greater: tradition at least recognizes
certain men of the civic excellence as divine, and we must
believe that these too had in some sort attained Likeness: on
both levels there is virtue for us, though not the same virtue.
Now, if it be admitted that Likeness is possible, though by a
varying use of different virtues and though the civic virtues do
not suffice, there is no reason why we should not, by virtues
peculiar to our state, attain Likeness to a model in which virtue
has no place.
But is that conceivable?
When warmth comes in to make anything warm, must there needs be
something to warm the source of the warmth?
If a fire is to warm something else, must there be a fire to warm
that fire?
Against the first illustration it may be retorted that the source
of the warmth does already contain warmth, not by an infusion but
as an essential phase of its nature, so that, if the analogy is
to hold, the argument would make Virtue something communicated to
the Soul but an essential constituent of the Principle from which
the Soul attaining Likeness absorbs it.
Against the illustration drawn from the fire, it may be urged
that the analogy would make that Principle identical with virtue,
whereas we hold it to be something higher.
The objection would be valid if what the soul takes in were one
and the same with the source, but in fact virtue is one thing,
the source of virtue quite another. The material house is not
identical with the house conceived in the intellect, and yet
stands in its likeness: the material house has distribution and
order while the pure idea is not constituted by any such
elements; distribution, order, symmetry are not parts of an idea.
So with us: it is from the Supreme that we derive order and
distribution and harmony, which are virtues in this sphere: the
Existences There, having no need of harmony, order or
distribution, have nothing to do with virtue; and, none the less,
it is by our possession of virtue that we become like to Them.
Thus much to show that the principle that we attain Likeness by
virtue in no way involves the existence of virtue in the Supreme.
But we have not merely to make a formal demonstration: we must
persuade as well as demonstrate.
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